Razoff's Hunt
by Lachimax
Summary: While Count Razoff hunts in the swamps, he encounters something new: a Robo-Pirate warship. As he escapes from the onslaught of machines, he begins to realise that this is something far worse than he has previously encountered: a full-scale invasion.
1. Part 1

**Razoff's Hunt**

The Marshes of Awakening

Razoff stared intently down the barrel of his rifle from amongst the roots of a Vastfall tree, taking careful aim at his prey. It was a dark purple marsh-serpent, grazing on one of the enormous lily-pads that populated this area of the swamps. Only the large head and front portion of its particularly long body were visible above the opaque waters as it munched on a piece of green plant matter.

Marsh-serpents, or _Serpentis velox,_ were a slippery species, acutely velocious at cutting through the visually impenetrable waters of their home, and notoriously difficult to track. They were smart, too, and although generally solitary were able to communicate with each other through a range of subsonic vocalisations. One or two had even learnt to speak the common tongue. He was lucky to have found one so easily, and one so distracted. A marsh-serpent head would make a fine trophy.

He centred his crosshairs on the back of the reptile's neck, just above the curious red scarf it was wearing. A rifle bolt to the spine would paralyse it without ruining a well-earned trophy, and allow Razoff to get close enough to finish the job.

His finger tightened on the trigger.

A sudden crash emanated from the canopy above, and the serpent instantly dived beneath the murk. Razoff let the projectile loose, but it whizzed uselessly across the marsh surface. "Son of a Livingstone!" he cursed quietly, punching a root in frustration, and already standing up to move after it. He didn't have time to dwell on his irritation, however, before a flying behemoth of wood and metal descended through the trees. Its bowsprit cut slowly through the air as it turned towards where the serpent had disappeared. Its twin spotlights scanned the surface below its menacing shape. Adorning its canvas sail, limp in the dead swamp air, was a skull-like head crossed with two spanners.

One of the most feared emblems in the galaxy.

Razoff froze, doing as little as possible to attract the attention of the hovering. Its yellow-glowing engines flared as, for some unfathomable reason, it set of in pursuit of the marsh-serpent, low to the water. Behind it dropped a trail of helicopter bombs, left to hover just above the swamp. To Razoff, intimately familiar with all tactics used to hunt prey, it seemed oddly like the ship was herding the creature.

He stood up, deciding it was definitely time to leave before more of the machines arrived, previous to one doing just that. The ship broke through the canopy in the same place as the former, and this time, its spotlights fell squarely on him.

Razoff summarily span and ran into the undergrowth, pursued by a salvo of energy bolts. The warship attempted to follow, but found his path far too thickly grown. Instead, it unleashed a stream of heli-bombs, then broke away to find another route.

Razoff dodged and weaved, and several of the skull-marked bombs blew themselves against interwoven branches. Two of them appeared seized by a higher plane of intellect, however, and swerved as he did. He could feel the breath from their gyrating blades against his neck, could hear them slicing the fetid swamp air with terrifying keenness.

As he ran – at a remarkable pace for one with such truncated legs – Razoff grabbed a supple passing branch with one hand, gambling his coordination against theirs, and released it swiftly. It sprang back and caught one bomb at its centre, detonating it instantly, while the second ducked under the fireball. The heat warmed his back as he went to leap a tree root, and in a display of abject inagility, misjudged the height and fell flat on his face in a splatter of mud. Without pause he rolled, seized his rifle by the barrel, and swung it at the black sphere with a hunter's strength. It sliced across the bomb's front and the bomb span out, rotor glancing off a tree trunk. Chips of bark sprayed into the air, but the bomb righted itself and, guided by some internal mechanism, whirred again toward Razoff. But by now he had the appropriate end of the weapon in hand, and fired a single, precise shot into the device's core. It blasted into fragments, a piece of shrapnel passing inches from Razoff's nose.

It was at this point that the warship smashed into the clearing Razoff had found himself in, and unfettered a volley of cannonballs in his direction. He pushed off the ground in a funny sort of stumbling dive, followed up by a roll, and the metal balls struck the muddy terrain just short of his feet. The ship fired a net of red energy from its crow's nest, apparently changing its tactics to contain rather than kill, and, ominously, a hatch near the bottom of its hull slid open.

Not waiting to see what emerged, Razoff turned and ran again, a flurry of shots following his feet. A chain of cannonballs shot past him and splintered a tall tree trunk in an attempt to halt him, but he slid to a stop and jumped over. Seemingly recognising its ability to slow him down, the warship released a whirlwind of munitions at the trees surrounding Razoff, and the entire grove began to collapse around him. Luckily, these were not Vastfall trees or it would have devastated the swamp for nearly a kilometre. He slid under a trunk before it hit the ground, dived over another, and rolled into a sprint. Amid the chaos he unhooked a metal vial from his belt, popped the lid and splashed its contents across his body. Lost in the wooden wind, he plunged into the swamp.

Almost any other land creature that attempted the same thing would have lasted a grand total of half a second before being chewed to the bone, and the other half before the bones were reduced to grit for a piranha's gut. But Razoff's family had been hunting this swamp for longer than anyone less than several centuries old could remember, and they had uncovered its secrets. They knew intimately the simple desires that drove every creature of the slimy waters, every motivating impulse haunting the minds of the basest of beasts. And, after generations of accrued knowledge, they knew what they feared.

Razoff lay two feet beneath the surface as the haze of wood settled, digging into the mud with his hands and feet to stop himself from rising, and prayed to Polokus that the sprayed pheromones would mask his own scent. He had heard stories about his great-uncle Woden, who had kept his vial past its best before. They only ever recovered the buckle from his left boot, and that had to be won in a tug-of-war with a Thorn Root cluster.

Looking to the surface, he saw a spotlight pass over him, outlining a curiously blocky shadow walking along the bank. Although his race was not amphibious and did need to breathe oxygen, they could last several minutes without a breath and could see sharply both underwater and in air. His eyes could penetrate a lot further than that spotlight. He hoped.

After a minute or so, the ellipse of light moved on, and the shadow followed with an electrical grumble. As it did, he noticed a tiny, black fish swim close to his head, its disturbingly intelligent white eye looking over this foul-smelling new addition to its environment, until another, larger specimen swallowed it whole. The pheromones must have been wearing off, or else the piranhas wouldn't have been able to bear being within fifty metres of him. He counted to thirty, then burst dripping from the putrid water and climbed out, plucking a particularly brave fish from his cuff and flicking it back into the swamp, where it was repaid for its courage by falling into the mouth of one five times as large.

Strange. Time was, the mating pheromones of a mire-kraken would clear the waters for miles around. They clearly still inspired a certain amount of caution in the marsh's finned and fanged residents, but not nearly enough. Perhaps that was because of their decline in numbers... a decline Razoff's family was in no small part responsible for. The piranhas didn't fear them as much because they hadn't encountered them for generations (short as the generations of such fish were). He would have to use his remaining vials sparingly.

Whatever that ship was, it had gone. Razoff shook the moisture from his rifle (waterproof, of course, through a delightfully clever selectively-permeable mechanism located in the barrel) and moved away, full of questions but hoping to get back to his mansion before he found the answers.

He was covered, head-to-toe, in mud, gunk, woodchips, and other substances he didn't care to think about. Luckily he was not wearing his best clothes. The red of the (frankly incredibly stylish) outfit he preferred at home would have stuck out like a Teensie's nose in the environment of the swamps, something most deconstructive to one whose most-loved pastime involved sneaking up on things. Instead, he wore brown, green and grey fatigues, specifically designed to render him close to unseeable. When he didn't move. Well... if he was under something. True invisibility was a luxury he could do without, especially if it meant he could avoid consorting with the witch of the Bog. He shuddered at the thought.

* * *

><p>Finding a suitable spot, Razoff lay low into the mud bordering a stretch of flat marsh, drawing the dense reeds over himself to camouflage from above. Consulting a compass and a detailed map from a pouch in his belt, he determined his exact location.<p>

He knew of two Hall of Doors portals not far from where he was, but that option was closed to him. If he made his way south, he reckoned, he could exit the Marshes fairly close to his estate, but then he would still have to cross about four kilometres of the near-treeless and near cover-less Bog of Murk, an unattractive prospect with flying pirate ships patrolling overhead. If he went south-west, however, he could use the immense cover of the Bayou to shield from prying optical sensors, and employ the series of tunnels from there to reach his manor.

Razoff checked that the coast was clear, then stood, got his bearings, and continued on his way.

* * *

><p>As he moved covertly through the boggy terrain of the Marshes, he examined his rifle carefully to make sure it had suffered no damage. Luckily, it hadn't endured anything more than a few superficial scratches, nothing a little polish couldn't straighten out.<p>

Razoff's rifle was his pride and joy. He had built it himself, as was the custom in his family, selecting every part with the utmost care and soldering, shaping and binding until the weapon resembled his own vision of perfection. The butt was polished wood carved from the perfect material found at the highest stretches of a Vastfall tree, and one of the mightiest of those at the Top of the World, rather than of its stunted fellows that populated the Bayou and Marshes. The barrel was long and slender, forged from an alloy of the namesake metal mined from the Iron Mountains and the famously pure carbon of the Cave of Skops, was shaped flawlessly to convey his custom ammunition straight and true towards its intended target, with a flash of gunpowder imported directly from the Echoing Caves. The sight, mounted atop this lethal cylinder, was perfectly adjusted for his keen reptilian eye, containing lenses obtained from the greatest Fairy glass craftswomen (for a not inconsiderable sum), and capable of varying degrees of magnification. The rifle's internal mechanisms, based loosely on blueprints acquired from a Ray arms dealer, had been assembled painstakingly in his workshop over the course of a week as he slaved with magnifying glasses and soldering irons.

What this all added up to was a perfectly deadly tool of the hunt, ideally complimenting the skill of the hunter who wielded it. It was more than a weapon: it was a work of art.

Razoff knelt beside a peculiar bootprint in the mud, examining its contours. It was identical to several dozen like it in the surrounding area, curiously angled and unlike any tracks he was familiar with, even in his impressive internal almanac of hunter's knowledge, built up over the course of decades on the hunt. These were brand new. All sets were exactly the same distance apart, all headed in exactly the same direction. They had to be related to the strange wooden aircraft, and the blocky shadow he had seen.

Making sure to stay alert for any hazard-heralding sounds, he followed the footprints along the ground for several metres, then froze. Freshly imprinted in the mud, above the tracks he was reading, was an enormous, three-toed paw-print. No, less a paw-print than a foot-print. It was almost a metre across. Razoff's eyes tracked left, to see another one, exactly the same. Further ahead were two even larger prints, at least a metre and a half across, like two titanic fists had pressed into the ground.

These were rare and ominous prints to find, especially here. He had to get out of here. The owners of such marks were well-known and well-feared for their territoriality. Razoff bent down for one more close look, plucking a coarse, auburn hair from between the toes, when he heard one of the most terrifying sounds of his life: a deep-throated, ground-vibrating, simian grunt, emanating from in front of him.

In the instant between his hearing the sound, and looking up, everything he remembered about the rare species of great ape known as the Xowar, _Insolitus ingens,_ flashed through his mind, like extracts of words jumping from a handbook.

_Intelligent, known to be able to solve puzzles. Able to move incredibly silently for its often multi-tonne bulk. Very strong, has been known to effortlessly rip trees out by the roots. Highly territorial, and highly aggressive._

He looked up, and there, watching him from between two trees, a glint of anger in its tiny eyes, was an immense, red-brown haired, bulk-armed, highly territorial, highly aggressive Xowar.

Hoping to Polokus that this creature's vision was movement-based, Razoff stayed stock still. It wasn't. With an echoing roar, the ape stood up on two feet, extending to his full 12-foot height, and pounded its chest with fists the size of large cauldrons, then brought them back down with a squelch that threw mud high in the air. Running on its knuckles, the immense primate launched itself forwards in twenty-metre bounds. Razoff managed to fire a shot, hitting its shoulder and having about as much effect as an axe on a kilometre-tall tree. The hunter dove to the side, splatting once again into the muck, as the Xowar skidded past. But the ape, with grace born of a life spent swinging a multi-tonne body from branches at hundreds, sometimes thousands, of metres in altitude, controlled its muddy slide to spin and pinch Razoff's waist between a thumb and forefinger both wider than it. Still travelling at high speed, the beast swung Razoff effortlessly into the air and released him to fly in a tumbling arc against a tree trunk. He slumped to the ground, counting himself lucky the Xowar had used only a fraction of its fantastic strength. Had it thrown with its entire brute potency, there would be perhaps two bones left intact in Razoff's body, and those two would likely be in the wrong places.

Winded and dazed, the Swamplander struggled to draw breath as the Xowar knuckled over at its own leisure. Luckily, such primates were curious creatures or he would already be dead. Lowering its head to the panting reptile, it drew a great intake of air through its nostrils, analysing the mixture of scents it bore to his senses. It grunted softly, a bone-shaking noise, as Razoff struggled to crawl away. It picked him up in the manner a person would a pet rabbit, pinching the back of his jacket between its thumb and finger, and lifted him to its face level with a shocking gingerness. Even as he faced death, squirming as he did, Razoff couldn't help but admire the great beast. Only one of his family had ever successfully hunted a Xowar, and they had been forced to abandon the body as another of the apes approached to inherit the newly unguarded territory. They truly were spectacular animals, and yet despite their massive strength they were in danger of going extinct.

_Too bad this one isn't,_ thought the Count as he was dropped back to the ground. He closed his eyes as the Xowar lifted a sheep-sized fist to pulverize the invader.

"Do not attempt to harm other slaves."

The cold, machine-like voice rang clear across Razoff's ears, punctuated by a scream of simian pain. He opened his eyes to see the Xowar, fist blackened, turning to face a new intruder. If it had been angry before, now it was off the chart.

A hail of red, glowing projectiles flew at the creature from all directions, singing fur and flesh. Roaring, the Xowar charged at one of the offenders. Razoff turned onto his side just in time to see a metallic figure smashed to atoms by the beast. Others quickly closed in, spreading into a ring around the enraged animal and firing inwards at it. Using immense fists to great effect, it smashed more of the machines to pieces, but apparently devoid of fear they continued to hound it, minimising the effectiveness of its primitive strategy by spreading apart so that it could destroy no more than one of them at once. Finally, the Xowar gave a great howl of defeat and loped away, battered and blackened.

One of the machines stepped toward Razoff, standing over him. It looked absolutely fearsome, with glowing eyes staring from a skull-like head that matched the insignia flown by the flying ships, complete, bizarrely, with gold earring. Its arms terminated not in hands, but in a hook and what looked like an energy weapon, the barrel of which was pointed at Razoff's face. "Identify."

Razoff attempted to climb to his feet, but slipped over and ended up face down, staring at the thing's gold-buckled, mud-coated boots.

The robot kicked him in the shoulder, eliciting a gasp of pain and a roll. "Repeat: Identify."

"Count Razoff Shoedsackovskaïa of the Bog of Murk!" he gasped. The robot nodded. "Identity confirmed: Swamplander. Viable slave specimen, capable of hard labour. Prepare to throw him in the brig."

Two more of the robots hauled him to his feet, slipping hooks under his arms. Razoff could feel cold steel beneath their torn jackets as they held him in place.

The leader was pressing buttons on its gun-barrel. "Prisoner acquired. Requesting transportation."

"Co-ordinates?"

"Swamp-designate, 347259."

"Special conditions?"

"Hostile wildlife in vicinity, potentially dangerous Class 4 mammalian. Suppression weaponry recommended."

"Request approved. Prepare for arrival of warship."

Razoff struggled, twisting against his captors' hooks. The purple-jacketed leader turned and struck him across the face with the smooth side of its hook. "Struggling will only weaken your working ability. And believe me; you're going to need your strength where you're going."

The machines released a burst of peculiar mechanical laughter, leaving Razoff bewildered. "What are you?"

The leader considered for a moment. "Information request approved, slave. We are the Robo-Pirates. And we are here to plunder your filthy planet until there's nothing left to care." This brought about a new round of laughter, which Razoff was unsure was justified.

The leader was suddenly silenced as a metal bolt buried itself in its forehead with a grating shriek. It reached up with a hook, only to have another bolt appear in its chest. The hole it created smoked and sparked as the machine collapsed. The two robots grasping Razoff released him and raised their weapons, suddenly alert to a new threat. Another bolt flew from the trees, taking down one of the soldiers, and was answered by a red bolt of energy, only for that to be answered in turn by a shot from the opposite direction. The sources of the bolts seemed to be constantly moving, coming from somewhere in the trees. The machines were thrown into disarray as several lost limbs to the high-velocity projectiles. Razoff took advantage of the confusion to scoop up his rifle, shooting accurately at the nearest robots. The Xowar-reduced force was rapidly depleted, leaving piles of scrap metal dotted across the clearing.

The attackers revealed themselves as three lithe, reptilian figures armed with crossbows swung down from their hiding places in the trees. They were Swamplanders just like Razoff, dressed in simple tunics. One, a light blue-skinned female, addressed Razoff as they approached him. "Hello, friend!" she called. "I'm Tahlis, and these are Thet and Vade," she said by way of greeting. The two males nodded briefly, keeping their crossbows ready and their eyes trained on the surrounding swamp. "You can thank us later. In the meantime there's bound to be one of those ships heading right this way, so we have to get out of here."

Razoff nodded, following them into the depths of the swamps.


	2. Part 2

Razoff's Hunt - Part 2

The following hours passed in a blur of pursuit, escape, and near-death. The four Swamplanders evaded the Pirate forces as only hunters being hunted can, laying false trails, splitting up and reforming, leaving traps. Twice they were forced into open combat with small squads of the machines, and twice they barely escaped.

As night began to fall, Razoff returned to a predetermined location after one of their divisions, finding Tahlis and Thet already inside the small cave. They raised their crossbows as he entered, lowering them when they saw his face. Razoff noticed that Thet was bleeding through a bandage wrapped around his leg. Razoff was himself covered in tiny scratches and bruises, and even sported a singed hand from where an energy blast had passed a little too close to him.

"Where might Vade be?" he enquired, his cultured accent a little more prevalent than he perhaps would have liked. Thet shook his head, grimacing with the pain of his injury. "Don't know. Might've been slowed down. He'll be back soon."

"We are not leaving until he is," Tahlis asserted, forestalling any such suggestion. She gazed at Razoff as she said so, and he was struck by the comely shape of her eyes.

She frowned, looking him over. "You look familiar. I don't think we caught your name."

It wasn't a question, but something in the way she said it made it clear she expected an answer. How they had managed such intense co-operation without even knowing his name was something of a mystery, but he replied.

"I go by the name of Razoff," he replied, painfully aware of the way his accent trilled the "R" in his name.

For a second Tahlis' brow furrowed, and then her eyes widened, first in surprise, then shortly in anger.

"You... you're..."

Her fists clenched.

"I knew I recognised you. You're a Shoedsackovskaïa slavemaster," she spat, speaking his family name as though it was a curse. He was entirely taken aback. "How dare you!"

Ignoring him, she continued: "I can't believe we risked our lives to save a _warlord!" _She looked near ready to seize him by the thin neck. "Don't you recognise him? He's Zaroff's vile offspring..."

She trailed off as she turned to see Thet leaning against the wall, clutching his leg, teeth gritted together.

"Oh, Teensie balls..." she muttered, crouching beside him. "It's getting worse, isn't it?"

She rounded on Razoff again. "All thanks to you!"

"Shut up," grunted Thet from behind his teeth. "We would have rescued him anyway, and you know it. No-one deserves [i]them[/i], even a..." He said a word unfamiliar to Razoff, but one he suspected pertained to his mother's husbandry. His rage at the obvious insult was quenched as he realised the implication of what Thet had said. "You have prior knowledge of these devices?" he asked Tahlis, again prompting a glare. "Plenty, but none you deserve to hear!"

She somehow managed to give the impression of storming off, despite the fact that the cave was barely large enough for the three of them to sit in.

Bewildered, Razoff took a seat at the rear. Thet sighed. "I don't like you either, but it looks like we're working together, so I guess you should know..." he was cut off by a cry of pain and a contorted face. Tahlis rushed once again to his side. "Haven't you caused enough pain?" she spat at Razoff. He turned indignantly away as she proceeded to redress Thet's wound. Sitting turned away from them, he closed his eyes and leaned against the cave wall.

It was true, Razoff's race had been greatly devastated during the chaos of the Warlord War, and his family had led them to it: his father, Zaroff Shoedsackovski, had commanded the Swamplander army which strove to contend with the powers of this world. But his father's life had been claimed by that war and his family had been lucky to escape lynching at the hands of their 'mistreated' people. In his view they had been punished enough. One of their mansions had even been burnt to the ground by the filthy masses when they lost the war.

_The Peasants always need a scapegoat,_ Razoff reflected.

The Swamplander Count awoke to find the chill of night permeating the cave. Thet had fallen into fitful sleep, and Tahlis was perched at the cave entrance, crossbow in her lap. Her eyelids were just beginning to sink. As he watched, her head nodded forward, then jerked up again.

He gave a quiet, derisive "Hmph." If she was falling asleep at the watch, it was her own fault.

Unfortunately he had underestimated the keenness of her tiring ears, and he surprised that the glare she shot back at him didn't set him on fire. "_I didn't hear you volunteering to keep watch,"_ she whispered venomously.

_Why would I when there are two commoners to do it for me?_ he wanted to retort, but instead remained silent and looked away.

"_Don't you turn your back on me,_" she hissed. _"Get over here!"_

Razoff grudgingly did so, deciding it was best not to stir up trouble. He sat at the opposite side of the entrance to her, the cold air chilling him like an iced drink.

"I may not like you, or what you stand for, or your family," Tahlis said in a low murmur, looking pointedly away from him. "But Thet's right. You're with us now and you need to know what we're up against."

"And what, may I venture to ask, are we up against?"

She glared at him again, and he was surprised to find that a dagger did not, in fact, appear in his chest. But she kept her retorts non-verbal, and continued. "They're called the Robo-Pirates, like they told you, and they're from another world. They come from somewhere up there in the stars." Which were barely visible through the heavily woven branches overhead. "They prowl across the void looking for worlds to rape. When they capture you they make you a slave and they take you away forever, to help strip other planets just like ours of everything that makes them beautiful."

She lowered her head. "There is no worse fate. No-one deserves that, to be subject to a race of _machines_ until you die of exhaustion. Not even you, although that's a close call."

Razoff remained sceptical. "How do you..."

"It doesn't matter," she snapped, and with that the conversation, one-sided as it may have been, was over.

It was morning, and Vade was yet to be seen. They awoke to a warship gliding above the sluggish river outside their cave. Even Tahlis couldn't deny that they had to move on. When the warship had passed well beyond sight, somehow redolent of a shark receding into the gloom of the ocean, she stepped out of the cave, lifted her head, and let out a haunting cry from deep within her chest, echoing across the tree-ridden Bayou. Razoff's adept ears immediately recognised a bird call, one he was most surprised to hear emanating from the reptilian mouth of a Swamplander. An answering cry came almost immediately, and a superb raptor dove from the branches high above.

More streamlined than a bullet as it plunged through the air, it spread its wings impossibly close to the rancid liquid of the river and made an impossible transition from vertical to horizontal with as little apparent effort as Razoff would take to pull a trigger. The bird swooped up and, flapping slightly, landed on Tahlis' outstretched (and leather gauntlet-protected) arm.

Its plumage was the deep, near-black blue unique to a Desert Eagle, complete with the characteristic white speckles around its angry eyes that never failed to remind one of stars peering from beyond the night sky. It squawked softly through a fiercely hooked beak as Tahlis presented it with a sample of meat, and shifted its weight on the heavily scratched arm-guard to hold the meat in one talon.

Desert Eagles were revered by the Knaaren as the form of God, and it was easy to see why. It was a truly beautiful creature, an expression of vicious poetry, and Razoff felt a sudden, near-irresistible urge to have it stuffed and mounted on his mantle. He did manage to resist, however, knowing the effect mentioning this urge to Tahlis would have on his bodily functions. Instead, he asked "How did you get that?"

"He's beautiful, isn't he?" said Tahlis, her distaste for Razoff seemingly eclipsed in adoration for this divine creature. "I raised him from a chick, ever since I found him in the Desert of the Knaaren. His parents were dead, some Teensie hunters killed them."

The hatred between Teensies and Knaaren was well-known throughout the Crossroads, so the thought of the normally-peaceable Teensies deliberately killing some of the Knaarens' most sacred creatures didn't surprise him. However the idea that Tahlis had travelled as far as the Desert of the Knaaren did surprise him, as most Swamplander peasants never ventured beyond the bogs they were born in.

She stroked the feathers on the eagle's chest, and as it finished its parcel it seemed very distinctly to nod, making eye contact with Tahlis for a second. Then Tahlis helped to launch it into the air, and it soared upwards.

"Fantastic creature," Razoff breathed, watching it rise inexplicably into the trees despite the lack of any thermals in the swamp air.

"Yes," agreed Tahlis, equally enrapt by the climbing figure, until she seemed to catch herself. "But you've probably hunted dozens of them," she glared.

Actually, he had never succeeded in slaying one, but had certainly made the attempt. He thought that those Teensies must have gotten lucky, but there was no point mentioning that.

She turned and called to the cave. "Thet! The coast is clear."

"What? Did the _bird_ tell you that?" he sneered.

"His name," she said with infinite dignity, "is Ganymede. And yes, he did."

They moved as old men through the swamps, Tahlis supporting Thet. Razoff grew impatient very quickly, wondering if he might do better on his own. _First sign of trouble, _he promised himself, _and I'm out._ The eagle, so-called Ganymede, flew ahead while they walked to check for danger, and several times they stopped and hid at its warning cries. Razoff's incredulity at the reliability of such a scout grew and grew with each passing occurrence, until minutes after the bird's warning a full squad of twenty Pirates swept past their hiding spot. From betwixt the five-pronged leaves covering a set of vines, they watched the patrol march across the bank. Walking behind the standard Pirates was what looked like a giant barrel with legs, two eyes peeking out from an eyeslit and a cannon of some description mounted on top. As they marched it was launching black balls from its weapon into the treeline, which exploded in green puffs of what Razoff strongly suspected was poisonous gas. _Some kind of flushing technique,_ he thought, then realised said technique was approaching them. The three of them moved away from the edge of the vines with absolute silence, and covered their faces with their sleeves. They turned away as one of the black balls landed right outside their little hiding spot. A cloud of insects fell broken-legged from the air, and a frog leaping from the water stiffened mid-jump and fell to the mud, but the three of them remained unharmed.

As they made their way through an unusually dry portion of thicket, Thet supported between them (a situation somewhat instigated by Razoff's impatience) when Ganymede swooped down to rest on Tahlis' forearm. She offered him a morsel of toadmeat from her satchel, but he remained closed-beaked. The navy eagle made a queer sort of gesture with his head then lifted off again, swooping across a body of water to roost in the middle branches of a tree. He called back to them with a lilting whistle.

Tahlis stared after him. "We need to follow."

Thet grunted something that may or may not have been agreement, but Razoff made his complaint somewhat more explicit. "What, follow the _bird?_" he sneered.

"Yep."

After a back and forth that increased rapidly in heat, they went with Tahlis' option and made a haphazard path across the alleged water, stepping across the (surprisingly strong) lily pads dotting the substance. No sooner did they reach Ganymede's tree, however, than did he took to the air again. He glided to a perch atop a fallen trunk, waiting once more with patient eyes.

This splintered chase continued for about a mile, with Razoff's exasperation steadily growing, until the great bird finally halted by an almost impenetrable line of trees. There he bided as the three hobbled through the mud, a picture of hieroglyphic fortitude.

As they drew closer Razoff began to perceive Pirates between the trees. He uttered a whispered curse. "Your bird has led us into a trap!"

"Shut up."

It soon became clear that the Pirates had another target; peering between the trunks of swamp trees, they could see a wide, slow-flowing river, and at its centre a small island. Robo-Pirates approached the island from all angles, wading through the shallow water with a distinctly predatory air. Huddled on the island was a group of perhaps a dozen small creatures, blue-furred and faintly violet-faced. They were squat (Razoff estimated they would rise to just above his waist-level) with stubby legs and long arms. Bulbous, downward-hooking noses protruded from their heads, which were crowned with striped antenna. These were quiverin with fear.

They were Uglies. At least, that's what his family called them. He had a vague idea they had another name but he couldn't recall what it was. He sneered. "This is what you led us here for? Pah! Let the Pirates have them."

Angry shock dominated Tahlis' face. "What!"

The argument that followed was an odd one, spoken in whispers but nonetheless full of anger. It ended with Tahlis storming away, crossbow in hand, her intentions clear, and Razoff watching her leave in bewilderment.

"A little piece of advice," grunted Thet. "Never try to argue with her when she's like this."

Razoff did not deign to answer.

A warship, guided by a signalling beacon, descended on the island. The Pirate guards nudged the Uglies toward the protruding ramp, and the sodden huddles marched regretfully forward,

A flaming bolt drew a spectral afterglow from the trees, punching through the centre of the aircraft's sail. Fire spread instantly across the canvas like a bloating spider of turbulent light stretching its spindly legs.

As though seized by panic the ship bucked suddenly. Perhaps the sail was somehow integral to its aerodynamic stability, or perhaps the pilot, mechanical though he was, panicked at the sight of flames licking across his craft. In either case the warship careened blindly into the nearest trunk, snapping its bowsprit like a fingerbone. Like a possessed horse it continued spinning, smashing one rear engine against the bank in a broken shower of sparks and dragged the other through the swampwater, allowing fetid liquid into the active engine and ensuing an upward cascade of steam. The ship spiralled into the water, tossing a great wave against the banks, then came to rest on its side.

The Pirates on the island reacted immediately, wading into the swamp to search the wreckage. That's when a second bolt, this one a streak of blood-red, dove into the water at the leader's waist. It seemed at first it had missed; but the surrounding swamp instantly exploded with teeming fish. Frenzied by the sudden scent of blood the legions of piranha attacked any movement regardless of edibility, and the Pirates found themselves suddenly inebriated with scores of ferocious teeth, competing madly to puncture their steel bodies.

Amid this a slim figure swung down from the trees clutching a vine in one arm and a crossbow in the other. As she landed she loosed another bolt into the head of a Pirate struggling to climb back onto the island, returning it face-first into the swamp and frying its circuits with newly-introduced water.

As she bent to reload her weapon another candidate emerged, dripping like an undead beast rising from the depths, behind her, hook raised. It drew it back to begin a slicing swing-

-and its head exploded in a mess of wire and silicon, knocking it back so that the hook passed within centimetres of Tahlis' neck.

Swearing oaths of the vilest persuasion, despite himself, Razoff drew the bolt-action of his rifle back and took aim again, taking another Pirate in the chest from his nest in the trees as Tahlis destroyed the mechanics of another. The rest stayed where they were, crushed into the murk by the sheer mass of squirming fish.

The Uglies cheered with little honks and squeaks, turning backflips with stubby legs, red mouths agape to reveal twenty teeth between them. Finding impossible purchase on scattered rocks, they guided Tahlis safely from the island to Razoff's bank.

"What, may I ask, is your plan now!" he bellowed with uncontained exasperation. The little creatures, recognising him straight away, gazed up with a wary malice foreign to their size. Their silence irked him, a direct opposite to the reason Tahlis was currently doing the same.

"There is no plan!" she exploded. "These are living, intelligent beings [i]I[/i] just saved! We help them however we can, we run as far as we can, and we protect them with everything we have!"

"Turtle faeces!" he burst, brandishing his rifle. "We look after ourselves first! First yourself, then your family, then your species. That's how it's been for a billion years and will be for a billion more. Rarely does an animal risk its life for its family, barely ever for a member outside its pack, and never, _never _for another species!"

"We are not animals! We can help them, we have that choice! We are not automatons driven by fear, we feel compassion and empathy and sadness."

"You think we are more than animals? You are sorely, sorely mistaken. I have been hunting my whole life, _lady_. I have seen the most intelligent, feeling creatures reduced to scrambling beasts when threatened by death. Fairies, Glutes, Teensies, Swamplanders, they all become the basest of cutthroats while under the hunt. Do you think the rabbit does not feel sadness when its family is taken for food, or that the wolf does not feel some measure of compassion for its prey? Of course they do, but they ignore it and they _survive_ because of it. We are all the same.

"Obviously not all of us," she said quietly, eyes shaped dangerously. "Because I am going to help them."

"You are mad! They will slow us down and then those machines will take us and kill us. I am not going to die for a pack of rodent slaves."

"They don't kill you!" she screamed, a drop of spittle flying from her mouth. "I told you! They put you on their little ships and they take you to other planets and they turn you into slaves. But I guess that doesn't bother you, does it? You've been treating these creatures like slaves longer than you've been hunting!"

"How in the name of Polokus' hairy left armpit do you know what they do! They're aliens! How can you possibly have any idea about anything they do?"

She became suddenly tight-lipped, her voice lowering to a near-whisper. "I just do. So if you're going to leave us to save your slaving prince's hide, go ahead. Because I am going to stay."

Razoff nearly threw his gun at the ground, but instead he turned and kicked at one of the plumper Uglies. It danced nimbly out of the way, death-staring him with a gaze to match Tahlis'. He stormed away, mud splashing onto his boots.

"They've been here before!" her voice yelled from behind him.

He stopped.

"That's how I know," she called. "I've seen them before."

He turned. "I'm listening."

"We need to get away from here first, but when we're somewhere safe I promise I will tell you everything."

8 BDR (Prior to Rayman 1), Darkwater Village

The Swamplander town had no defence from the cannons of the flying wooden ship. The skull on its sail rippled, as though laughing, as it took down the watchtowers with surgical precision.

A raspy electronic voice implored those armed with ranged weapons to cease fire or suffer the consequences, the earnestness of which was proven by a series of pinpoint laser-cannon strikes leaving charcoal corpses where once were people.

Swamplanders fled in every direction into the swamps they were named for. The ship paid them little heed, unleashing a squad of metal soldiers to land on the damp earth. They spread out and, with the threat of arm cannons, they herded those too slow to escape into the centre of the village.

Tahlis squeezed Erenn's hand into her own. The little girl was crying. Tahlis' mind flashed to the crossbow lying beneath her bed, the knife in her boot... but whoever these attackers were they were well armed and armoured. Resistance was more like to kill her than free her. So she hugged Erenn to her and whispered words of comfort. "Where's Da?" the child sobbed. "Is he dead?"

"No, sweetie, don't be silly. He'll be back soon."

"I'm scared, Ma."

So am I, sweetie."

A purple-clad robot strode through the prisoners, inspecting each one. The village fisherman broke a chair leg across its head. The machine turned and slashed a steel hook across his neck, and almost without transition he was on the ground, crimson blood gurgling through the gash under his fingers.

Tahlis stiffened. "Close your eyes, sweetie."

The robot pointed , apparently at random, as it moved through the crowd, and the recipients of his focus were dragged away by obliging minions. Some cried. One retched. Others tried to hold onto their families, only to be hauled apart by relentless hydraulic arms.

An iron shark moving through a shoal of lizards, the machine waded through the Swamplander villagers, selecting at will, until as though in a slow-motion nightmare its hook came to a rest.

Pointed at Erenn.

A thousand pinpricks broke across Tahlis' skin, to be swept away by a wave of ice. Her mouth slowly opened.

"No."

As though she hadn't spoken an ape-shaped robot clad in a blue-and-white striped shirt knuckled forward, raising a fist from the ground with a squelch.

"No!"

A grip of steel outmatched a grip of flesh, no matter how motivated by love, and suddenly Erenn was no longer in her arms.

"NO!"

"Restrain the female."

She didn't knw what was happening, she was jumping forward, something was holding her back, she was squirming, struggling, everything was a blur but Erenn. Her eyes were wider than a seal's, tears frozen on her cheeks.

"Why!" Tahlis screamed. "She's just a child! Please."

The purple robot stopped as it moved to its next victim, turned back to her. "We require a valid cross-section."

"Take me instead! Or as well. Please. _Please!_"

"We require a _varied_ cross-section."

The gorilla robot loped away, one arm looped around her child. "Ma!"

That's when the ape sprouted a javelin through its metal skull. It collapsed, sparking, and Erenn rolled away. Tahlis looked around wildly. Only one person in the world was that good with a javelin gun. Erenn's father and her mate.

She could see a lithe figure sprinting through the treeline, loading a javelin as it ran. He paused to take aim and fired once more with a barely audible uncurling of springs. The javelin's aim was true but a computerised mind was better., and the leader fired a shot from its arm cannon. The shot knocked the javelin off course and set it afire to land on the thatched roof of a hut, which swiftly took light.

Erenn's father was already moving again, but like a hawk from Polokus' nightmare the warship descended on him, spewing flames from a hatch in its hull. Two trees took fire instantly, twin pillars of seething light, and between them a figure of flame twisted and fell.

Somehow she broke free of the hooks at her elbows, somehow she ran. Not away, but toward the leader. Something was making a noise like tearing sheet metal, her throat was raw. She curled a fist and launched it into the machine's chest, felt bones and muscles tear. A metal brick slammed against her face and she was on the ground.

The machine walked away from her, standing over the deceased ape robot. "Curse these older models. CPU in the head, no back-up unit." He kicked it aside and scooped up Erenn by the shirt as she squirmed away. "We are done here. If we stay much longer the whole village will destroy itself."

She tried to get up, tried to follow, but all she could do was stumble and crawl. Erenn's cries faded, and she was gone.

Tahlis knelt at her mate's smoking carcass, barely more than ashes and bones. Somehow she wasn't crying. Why would she? This wasn't him. He was a creature of flesh and skin, with eyes and serious face instead of grinning skull and he would step out from behind a tree at any moment to wrap his arms around her.

She plunged her face into her hands. "Why?" she asked the universe.

"I believe the machine answered that already."

Tahlis' head jerked upward. Before her was a Limbless figure clad all in white, with an intricate mouthless mask inlaid with gold patterns covering her face. White hair flowed behind it to her shoulders, where a white cloak continued to her feet. Resplendent on her torso was a golden, five-rayed sun.

"They require a valid cross-section. Across the world right now other warships are taking samples of every race and returning them to their Surveyor ship. Then it will leave, report back to Rachara, and we'll have a real invasion."

None of this made sense to a grief-shocked mind.

"Who are you?"

The masked Ray lowered her head. "I am known as Dawn."

Tahlis' eyes widened. For a moment she was speechless. Then she asked "What will they do with my daughter?"

"She will be raised into slavery, as will you all be when they can get a Prison Ship here. But first they will test her in every conceivable way to see how well-suited your race is to every conceivable slave labour. They will dissect her and repair her and electrocute her and enhance her. Then she will become a slave."

Tahlis' fist clenched. "How do you know this?"

Dawn shook her head. "That, I'm afraid, will remain known only to me."

She began to stride away. "I am sorry for your loss. I must leave now. I have an army to lead. Mr. Dark is moving to strike at Picture City, and your Zaroff is proving to be more of a problem than I had anticipated."

She lifted her cloak.

"Wait!" shouted Tahlis. "One last thing."

Dawn turned her head. "Make it brief."

Tahlis' eyes burned. "What are they called?"

Despite the mask, she felt Dawn was smiling. Then in a swirl of her cloak the Ray was gone, leaving a pair of conjoined words hanging in the air.

"Robo-Pirates."

The Bayou, 4 BDR (Immediately prior to Rayman 2)

For a minute they sat in silence. The Uglies were completely still, antenna twitching as they reflected beneath a ceiling of twisted roots. Eventually, Razoff found his tongue. "When did this happen?" he asked quietly.

"Four years ago. While your father was away fighting his precious Warlord War." Her eyes turned to flame once more.

"I... I am sorry." His words seemed awkward, but he meant it.

She turned away. "I don't need your apologies."

She stood to walk away. "We can stay here tonight. But tomorrow we need to make for Torvus Grove as quickly as we can. That's the only place we have any hope of hiding."

Razoff agreed with the fact but not the sentiment. "Should we not be running rather than hiding? If we stay in the swamps they're going to find us."

"There is nowhere to run to. Don't you see? They're everywhere. Right now there are warships everywhere from the Fairy Glade to the Iron Mountains. They could have taken thousands of slaves already. Maybe some people are trying to fight but soon they'll be taken too." She closed her eyes. She seemed suddenly exhausted. "No matter where we go, they'll be there. The only way we have a chance is to find the Torvus Grove catacombs. They're big and tangled enough that maybe they'll take a little longer to find us."

Her eyes opened.

"But if I can help it not one more person is going to be slave to those things."


End file.
